Figured I shoot 22LR with ammo prices being high.

I paired the rifle with a Vortex Venom 5x25x56. The rifle liked Norma ammo much better than than it liked Federal bulk. Use to shoot 30-06 a lot about 12 years ago but pricing is not ideal anymore

honestly, even though 22 feels weak, I liked how hard it was to shoot even at 50 yards. Hard meaning, trying to keep the shoots at a quarter size.  

I love shooting handguns and this might be my next addiction.

Any tips on what I should try next time?

Ruger precision pictures

Match ammo gets match results.  Lapua Center-X, SK Match, Wolf Match.  But, you're only going to get so much out of the Ruger.  As long as you enjoy shooting, that's all matters.  

CZ 457, Bergara BMR, Tikka T3X will all shoot better than the Ruger.

Next step up from those 3 would be the Bergara B14R.  Then something from Vudoo Rifle Works.  That's where the real fun starts.

Read some of this thread, maybe all of it.  Do the shoot!

22lr-Tack-Driving-range-game

It can be fired at 25, 50 or 100 yards.  A lot of us have tried it, possibly everyone here. Some had higher scores than others, but everyone reports back that they liked the challenge.

I'm going on Friday.  I will be shooting at least one of the distances.

P.S. - Nice rifle, nice scope.

I've read where someone showed that feeding from the BX magazine dented the tips of bullets on the way into the chamber, he said he got much better single-feeding and avoiding the dinged tip.

The bergara seems like something I would spend my money on. They're about $1100, not bad. The vudoo is honestly too much money for me. Unless I was going to get seriously into competition then I can make the move.

the tikka looks more "simple". I like the option to have an adjustable cheek/pull reach.

my rifle was $535 OTD so vudoo is 4x more. I think I would rather pay to take a course with someone and have them guide me and fix my flaws.

I tested a ton of ammo with my Ruger Precision 22.

Best value is CCI Standard. Groups small but throws 1/10 to 1/15 flyers. Cheap and shoots smaller groups than 90% of ammo out there.
Next is SK Rifle Match. Groups about 10% tighter and only throws 1/20 flyers and those flyers are less extreme.
Last is CCI Green Tag. This are lots of the CCI Standard with few flyers and lowest SD from in house testing. Produced my smallest groups with this. Same as the best Lapua I tried but at a lower price. Another lot I bought after did not do as well. Too much of a gamble for the money.

I use CCI Standard for most shooting which is 5 to 8 cents and SK Rifle match when I want best accuracy. These have been stable across multiple lots. SK Rifle Match used to be 12 cents but is now more like 22 cents now. 25 cents is my cut off at this point for high end rimfire ammo. Anything more is not worth it.

Just an FYI... don't clean your barrel until accuracy drops off and use a bore guide when you do.
If you test ammo the first round of new ammo will often be WAY off. Never shoot the first round of a new ammo into a group.
Use a 10 round 10-22 magazine for best accuracy.

Where are you finding 22LR CCI for $0.05/round? Online?

at sportsman the cheapest I see is $0.08 for other brands. (CA prices)

I haven't cleaned my rifle. Why do you say use a bore guide??


forgot to ask, what's the point of the wax coating on Norma ammo? Has it been proven to help?

my buckmark did not like it and would never eject the old brass. I had to use a thin wooden dowel to push it out from the barrel end

interesting

I'll have to keep an eye on this thanks

The bore guide prevents excessive wear from an off-center cleaning rod.  Two important places are the chamber's throat and the muzzle.  I always use a bore guide.  Be sure your rod is straight.  

If I remember, I pull the rod thru the bore rather than push (for the nylon brushes and patch holder).  Some things, you just have to push (jag, cleaning pellets).


The wax is a lubricant for the lead bullet as it slides down the bore.  Without it, barrel leading would increase.


I had this same problem with ELEY ammo in my Buckmark.  The ammo did not have sufficient energy to fully cycle the action (main spring is too stiff).  Never use grease on the slide only low viscosity oil.

I run a T1x and it's definitely a competitive rifle. I use CCI Standard and at 50 yards it's a tack driver for sure. Groups start to open up at 100 and past 150 or so it really drops off being competitive in the competitions.

The bergara does have a nice custom chassis, but it's more expensive than the Tikka so I consider it a wash.

Love the Tikka, downside is the bolt lift is a bit heavy. If I upgrade..... Forget the Vudoo. RimX is what you want imo.

Norma Tac 22 or CCI Standard will get you a hell of a long ways. I clean.... Rarely. Takes a bit to settle back down after cleaning so I just don't clean until the gun starts telling me to.

Edit: what to try next? Competition. Nrl, prs, silhouette. Doesn't matter. Rimfire comps are a hell of a lot of fun. Protip... Buy a bag or two if you plan on it, and not a damn Caldwell

CCI SV shot the best groups out of my RPR. That ammo did better than all the expensive stuff in my particular gun. My CZ 452 will still outshoot the Ruger with ease.

I'm going to test CCI SV next. My rifle likes Norma already

what bags do you recommend? I'm actually looking for a squeeze bag right now as my current one gets caught up with the angle of the stock

Make sure you are buying CCI Std Velocity in the cardboard bricks of 500 with 10 boxes of 50 you will note that same plastic divider in the cardboard box that goes in the 100ct plastic box.

For the NRL22 stuff I own the following bags

Armageddon Game Changer
Armageddon Fat Bag
Tab Gear Rear Bag, Large

The Game Changer is used the most by a large margin, the Tab Gear is used the least. The Fat Bag is very situational and not something you'd use for just benchrest shooting. The Game Changer would also work if you had a bipod on the rifle as well. But these bags are more for NRL22 work and not so much benchrest stuff so I dont know if I'd go drop 3 or 400 on stuffed pillows just to shoot off a bench.

Also, to get an idea how hard it really is....If you havent yet done it download a ballistics calculator and play around with it. Model a 22 cal bullet at 40 grains, 1080fps and ballistic coefficient of .138. Set zero at 50, 5mph crosswind and check drops from 50 out to 200. Its kind of eye opening how challenging rimfire really gets once you start reaching out there....And how much the wind impacts it! You can have a day with mild off and on gusts and you end up all over the damned place at 150

$400 is not much when it comes to dedicated benchrest shooting gear.

Benchrest shooting is a wierd thing - the rifles, set up and skills are unlike anything else in shooting.  

No its not, especially if you are shopping for a high end rest. I didnt state it well earlier, I should have said "Buy the gear for the intended role". Proper gear isnt a "one size fits all" sort of thing, so dont go dropping a bunch on bags when what you need are rests for example.  As the saying goes, mission dictates gear.

I took the challenge and I sucked big time lol    

the first time I went shooting I noticed the rifle likes Norma and hates federal accu-shoot (bulk)
Today I took some CCI standard velocity and holy smokes. I got one impressive group.  

I have a question, what size groupings would be considered excellent, good and needs improvement at
50 yards
100 yards
150+ yards

While shooting the challenge, I noticed if pulled from the very bottom of the trigger, it was getting better results.  Pulled from the middle of the trigger and having to safety lever in the trigger was very distracting.  I would like a flat trigger on this thing and so far I see Timney makes a flat face trigger that can go as low as 0.8# for $260

What would be the negatives of having a trigger pull this lite on this type of rifle?

CCI standard velocity will get you 97% of the way to it's absolute accuracy potential with the factory barrel.  If you want to make a real precision rifle out of it I suggest getting a match barrel with a real match chamber for it.  Shaw makes a good one and it won't break the bank.

BTW, I had a Vudoo and I found that it wasn't really any more accurate that my Ruger with the Shaw barrel, but that's not putting down the Vudoo.

Attached File

How much is that Shaw barrel and chamber? Once you count the price of the new barrel and the rifle, couldn't you have bought a "better" stock rifle for the same price? Or cheaper? Or how much did you end up spending on this set up compared to the Vudoo?

Don't worry, I won't tell your significant other how much you spent.

Just wondering

Way less $ into the Ruger than what I spent on the Vudoo.  I paid $360 for the RPRR on sale locally and I bought what was likely the first Shaw barrel sold for it at about $200.  The Vudoo was $1800 for just the barreled action with no stock or trigger.

$360!!

that must have been a few years ago. I got a "deal" on mine about two months ago and $460 plus fees ($535OTD) was the cheapest I could fine here in CA.

I'll look into the barrel but my priority might be the timney trigger  

Optics planet has it for $239!

As mentioned one of the key factors in 22 performance is ammo.

With the exception of the occasional “good” lot of CCI standard velocity ( the only domestic ammo worth even trying IMO)
You are most likely to get your best results with some sort of European ammo like Lapua RWS SK or Eley.

Keep in mind when switching to a different ammo to accuracy test, a barrel needs 15-20 rounds of “seasoning “ with the new bullet before your groups will reflect what is possible with that ammo.

So when accuracy testing and switching ammo don’t test for groups prior to tossing away 15-20 shots on an alternate target before settling in to shoot groups

Thats a flawed question.

That question means you are comparing yourself to others. You are only competing with one person. You. Go out and shoot a few groups at those distances and see how they are. The big fucking caveat is we're dealing with rimfire, which is a fickle bitch. You might have shot what should be a great group but you end up getting fucked by wind or ammo. Worse, you might not even have known it! But I'd chase consistency more than group size....ie....If you can do 10 groups and they are all 1.2 inches I'd prefer that over 10 groups of which 2 are 1/2, 3 are 3 inches and the rest somewhere in between.

My personal measure is 5 shot groups from a bench, 1/2" at 50 and 1.5" at 100. I'm gear limited as much as shooter limited at that level. I'm also not consistent. I can absolutely do better but as long as I can maintain those sizes I'm good to go in the PRS stuff I shoot as that size is smaller than the targets. But, my groups open up (substantially sometimes!) when I stop shooting from the bench. My wobble is probably around 3/4 on a good day from the bench so I need to improve my control to get better. Couple that with ammo that may be 3/4 or more ammo and suddenly 1.5 isnt so bad for me!

But remember, you arent competing with me. I also dont care if you shoot better or even much better, since I'm not competing against you.

Truly, it is a quest for personal improvement, a personal best, however, there are some absolute standards if you care to look at them.

It requires two set of data - the NRA classification scores and the NRA target dimensions.  These are readily available online.  I copied and pasted one set below, just so you can see the info behind the example.  It is all from the 2020 NRA Smallbore Rule Book.

My personal reference point is that a Expert classification is darned good, no matter the distance at which it is earned.  Everyone is a Marksman (if you shoot).  Sharpshooter comes after that.  Expert requires some seriousness, Master class requires a lot of work.  All are doable.

I don't know what distances you plan to shoot or which positions you plans to use.  Look it over and see what makes sense to you and where you might fit into this scheme, even if you do not officially compete.

For example, to make Sharpshooter in outdoor conventional prone requires firing 200 shots with a minimum average score of 96.50 out of 100 points (for 10 shots) on a target whose 10-ring is 0.719".  That means a mean diameter of 0.943" in diameter.   At least 193 of the 200 shots fired have to score as tens.

By analogy, you need to shoot at least a 24/25 in the "Tack Driver Range Game" and do it eight times (200 shots).


19.15 Individual Class Averages - Competitors will be classified as follows and NRA Classification Cards issued accordingly:
TABLE 2 - INDIVIDUAL

(a) Outdoor Conventional Prone - 200 shots minimum required for classification.
Master........................................................99.50 and above
Expert.........................................................98.50 to 99.49
Sharpshooter..............................................96.50 to 98.49
Marksman..................................................Below 96.50



4.7 50 Yard Target. A-27/5,5 bullseyes.A-27/6, 6 bullseyes. 50 meter target reduced for firing at 50 yards. For use in Conventional Prone competition only. 3.89 inches diameter black.
X ring.......................0.359 inch 7 ring..............2.879 inches
10 ring......................719 inch 6 ring..............3.599 inches
9 ring...................1.439 inches 5 ring..............4.319 inches
8 ring...................2.159 inches 4 ring..............5.038 inches

I heavily edited the above post to remove a lot of the data that is readily available in the handbook.